BHAGYA NAMASUDRANI AND ANOTHER Vs. BIMAL CHANDRA CHAKRAVARTY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE land involved in this second appeal measures 2 Bighas, 8 Kathas 8 Chataks and it forms the eastern part of dag No. 32 of Second R. S. Patta No. 9, Mouza Bishnupur, Pargana Barnaipur. District Cachar. It was originally the ownership of Lakhindra Mohan Chakravarty. According to the plaintiff -respondent, Bimal Chandra Chakravarty, he had purchased this land from Lakhindra Mohan Chakravarty on 6 -1 -53 by a registered deed marked Ext. 1. At that time, according to the case of the plaintiff, the land was in the possession of Guna Namasudra, the father of defendant No. 2 Gopendra Namasudra, on bhagi terms, and since no bhaginama had been executed by Guna Namasudra for the year 1953 -54 Lakhindra Mohan Chakravarty secured the bhaginama Ext. 2 dated 15 -4 -53, from him and made it over to the plaintiff. Guna Namasudra undertook to give 8 maunds of paddy respecting the year 1953 -54 and he actually delivered that much paddy to the plaintiff. Thereafter although no fresh bhaginama was executed by Guna Namasudra, he continued to deliver 8 maunds of "chukti" paddy from year to year until his death sometime in February, 1965. Immediately after the death of Guna Namasudra, the plaintiff pleaded, his son Gopendra Namasudra, the defendant No. 2, was asked to deliver possession to the plaintiff, but he failed to do so. Instead, that defendant in company with the defendant No. 1 Bhagya Namasudrani, his aunt, demolished the ridge (called ail in local dialect) separating the eastern land in dispute from the western part of dag No. 32 and made it a part of the latter land which had been purchased by them from Lakhindra Mohan Chakravarty. That development left no alternative to the plaintiff but to file a suit for khas possession of the land on declaration of his title thereto.

(2.) THE suit was resisted by the two defendants who put in a joint written statement. Their defence in substance was that they held the land on jote rights under the owner Lakhindra Mohan Chakravarty and that by the date of the suit they had acquired rights of occupancy therein. It was resolutely denied that Guna Namasudra had ever possessed the land as an Adhiar either Under the plaintiff or his predecessor.

(3.) THE defendant's appeal in the Court of the Assistant District Judge proved abortive, he having affirmed the various finding of the Munsif on which the latter had founded his decree and having held, in addition, that the rights of an Adhiar are not heritable. Having felt aggrieved, the defendants have come up in second appeal to this Court.